


the red valkyrie is dead, long live the red valkyrie

by detectivemeer



Category: Carmilla (Web Series)
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Poetry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-30
Updated: 2015-09-30
Packaged: 2018-04-24 02:26:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 442
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4902013
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/detectivemeer/pseuds/detectivemeer





	the red valkyrie is dead, long live the red valkyrie

it’s your second choice on a list of five but they boast their library—‘a near dangerous selection!’—and you already took two years of German so you think: it could be an adventure.

summer is sweet among the green and the girls’ hands, painting your initiation on your skin with steady fingers. you are kissed by a dozen mouths. on your cheek, your forehead, the curve of your jaw. they say, _welcome home_ , and they say, _sister_ , branding you on the forest floor, white flowers in your red hair, red blood on your pale skin.

your heart beats for a girl, whip smart and too kind by half. careful, you want to warn her, careful, careful. cruel beasts feast on kind girls, you learned that long ago.

your sisters say you’re bullheaded and arrogant and they sing ‘Danny and Laura, k-i-s-s-i-n-g’ even when it makes you blush and stutter and shove them shrieking with laughter off your twin bed. they challenge you and tease you and you shoot apples off the tops of their heads and hold them when they cry and you never knew, you still don’t quite understand how, your body could hold so much love.

you grew up too tall and too loud for your town. your fists and throat and hair all shout, you’re one part gun powder one part spark. you kissed your best friend at thirteen, shaking and daring the world to stop you; she tasted like birthday cake ice cream and you never apologized for holding her hand at the winter formal. you built yourself from their hate and their stares and now they’re forced to crane their neck to look at you.

you’ve got scars on your knuckles, some old, some new, because you’re a damn tragedy; you never learned how to stay down, you never learned how to make yourself small. you’ve got a city block of a chip on your shoulder. you’ve got a knife in your back and blood on your hands and you wish your body was less literal, more metaphor.

you’re not scared. you’re not.

(but maybe—but maybe you wish you had just a little more time. maybe you wish you could hug your mom better than you did the last time you saw her, or you hadn’t put off watching the new Doctor Who episode, or you ate a better last meal than a granola bar and water from the drinking fountain. if you lived—maybe you could do some things better—maybe they’d let you—maybe she’d—and what about all those assignments still due—and you wish you were stronger that you could just—)


End file.
